


The Secretkeeper

by rho_nin



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Era, Gen, Hurt Merlin (Merlin), Hurt/Comfort, Merlin's Magic Revealed (Merlin), Oblivious Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Rated For Violence, Spies & Secret Agents, Spymaster!Merlin, Torture, Whump, and less hurt/comfort and more hurt/catharsis, and now for my all-time favorite tag i found, and some mild language, ish, really more of, suspiciously intense gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:35:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22918546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rho_nin/pseuds/rho_nin
Summary: Merlin and Arthur are captured, and it only gets worse from there.Arthur tries to uncover the secrets everyone seems to know but him, just as Merlin is trying to bury them even deeper.
Comments: 18
Kudos: 202





	The Secretkeeper

**Author's Note:**

> Slightly more specific warnings: description of breaking fingers, description of injury, description of medical exams, description of self-harm/mutilation (scraping at skin in a delirium, not cutting or burning).

Unfortunately, Arthur was not unfamiliar with the inside of foreign dungeons.

He wasn't comfortable in them by any measure, but he had seen his fair share and knew from the minute he'd woken up with a glaring headache and an ache in his shoulders from the awkward position of his arms that he was going to be interrogated, and that was fine. It wasn't going to be pleasant, but it was fine.

He wasn't familiar with the feeling of someone else leaning (or lying, really, but Arthur had his dignity to maintain and being a pillow for someone didn't help matters) on him in a dungeon. It was dark—too dark to see by, but light enough that his eyes played tricks on him—and he couldn't _see_ the black hair or protruding ears, but he was sure from the moment he sensed the weight of another person that he was imprisoned with Merlin.

Great. Maybe he could juggle for their captors and expedite their passing.

He tried to talk to Merlin, but his servant was fast asleep. Or out cold. It depended on the cause.

At some point, not too soon after he'd woken up but not too much later, either, Merlin slumped from Arthur's shoulder to his lap, and no amount of shoving or cajoling would move him.

Later, though Arthur couldn't really say how much later, the rays of the sun streamed through a tiny hole in the wall near the ceiling. Arthur couldn't tell if it was a deliberate feature on the part of the architect or the product or years upon years of neglect and decay. Regardless, he didn't like what he saw in this new light.

Merlin was bleeding and had already bled quite a lot, judging by the fresh stains covering almost every available garment in the room. Not, judging by Arthur's inexpert eyes, a fatal amount, but still more than enough to be concerned.

"God's wounds," he said, realizing for the first time how thirsty he was.

Then Merlin opened his eyes, and Arthur wished he hadn't.

"Sorry, Arthur," was the first thing out of his mouth. Not 'how are things' or 'where are we' or even 'ow.' What had he to apologize for? Unless he'd hired the people who had done him this abuse, Merlin could hardly be found at fault. "This is going to be messy."

"What's going to be messy?" Arthur asked in return, trying and failing to keep the worry out of his voice. They were already in a dungeon with far more than nominal injuries. How much messier was it going to get?

Merlin groaned. "Everything." Then, to Arthur's continuing horror, he pushed himself up.

"No," Arthur snapped. "Lie back down. Don't even think about trying that again or... you'll be in the stocks for a week."

"You wouldn't," replied his manservant, despite following orders. "You don't even know the havoc the stocks wreak on my back. After this debacle? Not a chance." There wasn't a hint of pain in his voice, and Arthur wasn't sure yet if that was relief or not.

"I'm sure I can persuade Gaius to find you a suitably unpleasant substitute."

"Undoubtedly. But I'll make sure you regret it later."

Arthur didn't want to ask how. He did want to ask if Merlin remembered how they'd gotten here since Arthur hadn't a clue, or if he was quite sure that his injuries were survivable given their current conditions since that called other things into question that were infinitely worse to contemplate. And, horror of horrors, he couldn't let on how much he _worried._ So rather than ask anything regarding health, Arthur stirred the pot of his brain for a second before asking, "How soon do you think we can get out of here?"

Merlin huffed and touched his neck. "'Not soon' is my guess."

"Thank you, Merlin, for that font of enlightenment that is your smart mouth."

"I'm glad you think it's smart, sire." Merlin's eyes landed on Arthur's forehead and he frowned.

Arthur snorted. At least there was no end to Merlin's good humor. It would put him in high spirits when he came back battered and bloodied from whatever their new captors wanted from them, and that was the key to holding out until escape became an option. Still, the blood was worrying.

"How can we see to those cuts?"

Merlin ignored him. "How bad does your head hurt?"

"Not bad at all." It was a lie, but it seemed somewhat inconsequential compared to the gore covering his manservant. "You could do worse with a broom and your skinny arms. How're your battle wounds?"

"Worried, sire?" Merlin flashed a grin at him.

"Not in the slightest. But you're staining my pants and they'll take ages to wash out properly. I do so like these pants, you know. So. How can we see to those cuts?" He wanted to do something differently; do something that reassured Merlin without making the idiot think he _cared._ But he couldn't think of anything different to do, so he squeezed Merlin's shoulder and didn't expect the low hiss that replied.

"Avoiding touching that might be a good start."

"What else?"

"Nothing, Arthur. I'll live."

"Yes, and I'm a porpoise. I can't have a dead servant; do you have any idea the difficulty of finding a new one? I just can't be bothered." He shook Merlin gently, not knowing enough to really help, other than that keeping a patient awake was important.

"Then I suppose we ought to get you a tank."

 _"Merlin—"_ He jostled Merlin again, this time because he couldn't help himself in his anxiety, but fairly yanked his hand away as if burned, when Merlin spat at him incoherently, looked him in the eye, and sat up, slowly and deliberately. There was no mistaking the fact that Merlin was thinking about the leech tank or some other chore Gaius could inflict on him, nor could Arthur be fooled for a second into thinking he cared about the consequences of his actions. Something had shifted and Arthur didn't know what, but he didn't like it.

"I need you to take off my shirt," he said, too calm, "and I'll walk you through some exams."

Arthur didn't like the implication of that. He tried to pretend his heart hadn't just skipped a beat and thundered in a panic to make up for it. "Can you not move your arm?"

"It's better not to take any undue risks until I know the extent of the damage," Merlin replied. Arthur felt like he was hearing double, Merlin and Gaius and Merlin layered on top of each other. "So, sire, if you please, remove my shirt and we'll get to everything else once it becomes pertinent. I'll tell you what you need to know about my injuries and, for fuck's sake, don't badger me while we do this."

His obscenity was the only hint that there was something beneath the tepid pond of his expression.

Arthur had rarely obeyed an order so quickly, even if it did come from his own manservant.

The picture of battle painted by the injuries on Merlin's skin did not comfort him. It was hard to tell where everything was, thanks to the blood, but Merlin was holding his left arm strangely and there were already a few blossoming bruises blotching across his chest. Merlin looked down as soon as he was free of the shirt, his gaze nothing more than a professional mask, as if he was looking at someone else's torso. He raised his good arm as if to poke something before dropping it and looking to Arthur, still with the unfamiliar expression of cold distance that was becoming less convincing by the second.

"Arthur, we don't have the equipment to do this properly, or even to wash these to my satisfaction, but if you can blot away some of the blood with my shirt, we may have an easier time of it." As soon as that was underway, he continued, "Next I need you to poke at my ribs. Not too hard, just press inwards from the sides."

Arthur tried to follow it all to the letter, but Merlin still sucked in a breath and held it after the third test until the end, when he expelled it all in one explosive gust. There was so much on Merlin's chest that wasn't new and could, hypothetically, be ignored for the sake of expediency, but there were _scars._ Scars over scars over scars over scars, with nary a patch of unmarked skin. He gaped for as long as his brain let him, only interrupted by his servant's instructions.

"I'm going to look at the window now," Merlin explained, in a patient voice he had surely learned from Gaius, "and I want you to see if my pupils are symmetrical. Tell me immediately if they aren't."

They were, and Arthur assured him of this several times before Merlin was truly convinced.

"Now, let's check the mobility of my arm. Just pick up my forearm and move around— _gently_ —and I'll tell you when—"

He was interrupted by the hard sound of boots upon stone coming closer, closer, closer... until they were right outside the cell door, and Arthur knew that it was time to get up and endure.

A key twisted in the lock. Arthur's grip on Merlin tightened, loosened, tightened again. Something not altogether to his liking was about to happen and he didn't see any way around it, but at least he knew how to carry right on through it. At least he was the King's son. At least the world was spinning the way he knew it to.

And then it wasn't.

The men—hulking, unintelligent brutes wielding blunt objects that, he thought, ought to fit the dent of his forehead suspiciously well—entered the dungeon, as Arthur knew they would. He wouldn't fight when they grabbed him, wouldn't make a spectacle of himself. He would go with them and he wouldn't say anything, not even his name, not even his country, no matter how much they already knew.

But they picked up Merlin instead.

And suddenly all the careful control Arthur had learned flew out the tiny, accidental window left by careless stewards. He wanted to scream and yell and hit something and hit _them_ and _yank_ Merlin back in with him, even if he was in a dungeon and they were hauling him out by his armpits.

 _"No!"_ he shrieked, trying to express all of that at once and not knowing how, "you can't _touch_ him, he's innocent! Take me, instead— _I know more than he does!"_

The three thugs paused, sneered at each other, opened their mouths—but it was Merlin who looked back at him, that empty look in his eyes tempered by something sad, and said, "No, Arthur, you don't."

Then they were gone, still lugging Merlin around like dead weight and leaving Arthur to a strange coldness that didn't come from the stone or the drying blood sticking to his skin.

The light shifted over time, and at a time Arthur guessed to be noon, a plate of bread and a cup of water was slid into the cell. Arthur picked it up and carried it back to the corner he'd been sitting in, trying to decipher everything that had happened and turn it into something that made sense. He wasn't having much success. What did Merlin know that he didn't? What could these barbarians learn from a servant that they couldn't learn from the prince?

It was quiet, unnervingly so. He'd expected to hear cries for mercy, even wordless shrieks, but all he could hear when he strained his ears were some scuffles and grunts. He didn't want to think about everything that could mean. Had Merlin betrayed him? Had he been drugged or in some other way; dulled to the point of silence?

He could barely think of escape without Merlin there to prattle on as an idiot, particularly because Merlin was at the heart of the very quandary he hoped to unravel. He could hope for rescue, but that was never a good thing to count on. Goddammit, _all_ the gods dammit, he was stuck in a stupid, crumbling castle with no answers and a manservant that was half-dead (he wasn't, but it was easier to be harsh). How long would they persist in this diet, anyway? He couldn't live off bread alone and the water was a blessing, but not enough. It definitely wouldn't be enough for the both of them, if Merlin ever came back. If they _returned_ him, since Merlin seemed to play no part whatsoever in moving himself.

Still, he ate the bread and drank the water, shoving all misgivings about them away. He couldn't let himself starve on account of his snobbery regarding meals. He had to be strong enough to do something for himself when the time came, whether his escape involved Merlin or not.

At least all that hurt was his head. Merlin was already in worse shape than him; there had been no disguising it, no matter how Merlin hated to be fussed over. Arthur suddenly had to fight his own body to keep the bread down. The blood was fine, it was _fine,_ but it was Merlin with all that blood. Merlin, his helpless manservant, who was being tortured now for a reason Arthur couldn't even fathom.

He reached out to the wall to steady himself as he tried to stand, just to judge his own health. He didn't like lying to Merlin, but he could do whatever the hell he wanted; who was Merlin to tell him otherwise? Anyway, the idiot would probably have thrown himself into a tizzy trying to fix whatever he thought was wrong with Arthur, rather than dealing with his own, not insignificant, injuries that really needed to take precedent. How was Arthur supposed to deal with any of them when the best he could attend to were cuts from swords?

By the time Merlin was dragged—truly dragged this time, with only a few stumbling steps Arthur could see—the prince had well and truly forgotten that he'd ever suspected Merlin of treachery. The servant's eyes were glazed and cast about the cell without seeming to recognize any of it. His hair was soaked with water and the little finger on his left hand seemed broken, given the angle it hung at. Arthur snarled at the thugs who'd returned him; they were the same ones that had taken him away in the first place and there was nothing Arthur wanted more than to tear them all to shreds with nothing but his own bare hands, his nails tearing at the flesh and pulling them apart...

But Merlin couldn't even walk.

The brutes fairly tossed him into the cell, and Merlin did nothing to catch himself; no, that responsibility fell to Arthur, who cradled his friend's thin, shaking frame in his arms as he eased him to the ground. He couldn't tell how well Merlin understood what was happening around him and he was loathe to harass him into speech after whatever had just been done to him, but they needed to make a plan of action. Merlin had to be awake enough to argue with him. To tell him what he was doing wrong when he tried to fix Merlin's battered body.

He didn't move from his spot on the slimy ground. He lay Merlin across his legs and patted at his cheek, hoping to coax him gently into wakefulness, but it didn't seem to do anything. Merlin was still pale and shuddering, likely with cold. They hadn't gotten him back into his shirt before he'd been taken away.

The sun set through the window and still, they did not move.

When the room had at last returned to darkness, Merlin spoke again. Arthur had no idea if he'd slept at all, but all that came out of Merlin's mouth was a ragged croak that he _hoped_ was a remnant of grogginess, not some other abuse. "How are you?"

"How am _I?"_ Arthur rubbed Merlin's scalp, trying to keep the chill at bay. "Merlin, I'm not the one who was dragged in here without being able to stand on my own two feet. I'm not the one who's wet in a cold cell. Merlin, you were already in a bad way and I don't even know what happened for the rest of the time you were away. Are _you_ okay?"

"'m fine."

"Not a chance. I'm telling you, tell me the _truth._ No, Merlin, I'm _ordering_ you. You can't convince me that all this is fine."

"It's..." He trailed off, and for a moment Arthur thought him asleep. "Not ideal."

"No fucking shit."

"I've had worse, though. Don't worry about it."

Arthur did very much worry about it, and in fact had only more to worry about if there was something worse than all this—but then Arthur recalled the scars and believed it. It was a sad, reluctant belief. The idea of Merlin the Idiot facing injury and abuse to the point that he could be blasé about torture was not something he wanted to think about, but it was now foisted upon him. Now, choosing to ignore that fact, the fact that his servant had been injured again and again and he had never known, would be unconscionable.

"Really," Merlin said, "they didn't even ask anything that warranted all this effort. They weren't particularly good questions."

The urge to scream was still repressible, but not for much longer. "Merlin," he said sternly, "give them what they want. You're not cut out for this. Let me take care of it."

"You have no idea what I am or am not cut out for," returned Merlin, which was a reassuring response but not the one he wanted to hear. "I might be extraordinarily talented at enduring torture."

"I hope you aren't."

There was some silence, with only the quiet _drip-drip_ of a leak somewhere until that seemed to realize it was an interloper and ceased, as well.

"Ah, well," said his servant, "it's the thought that counts."

They didn't speak again that night (or what they thought was that night). They fell asleep, both engulfed in their own thoughts, clinging to the fact that there was another person there with them, even if it was the worst of circumstances.

* * *

When Arthur woke the next day (or, at least, when next he woke, for he didn't spy any light peering through the hole in the wall), it was to the brutes ripping Merlin from his arms. He grasped for a hold on Merlin, who seemed not to be entirely awake himself, but to no avail. His efforts were met only with harsh, unpleasant chortling and a distinct and unhidden scorn. He didn't know what to do to these people, not now. He knew what he _wanted_ to do—wanted to have his sword back in his hand, swinging like a pendulum through skulls and breastbone; wanted to see what the brains, small as they must be, of these men looked like; wanted to bash at their kneecaps until their stupid, stubby legs bent the wrong way—but he couldn't do any of that. He was in a cell and weaker than he would have liked, still not prodigious in his balance or exactly at the threshold of 'fighting fit.' If he made a move now, it would be suicide and he would leave poor Merlin to deal with it all alone, even if he seemed determined not to have it any other way.

But he didn't know what to do, so he fell asleep again.

He woke up at some point after the sun had risen. It looked much like something that could be noon, and there was a plate of bread and water at the mouth of his cell. This time, however, the rats had gotten to it. Not that he let it put him off, too much. His father had always called for strength in the face of adversity, but his old teachers had told him to never turn down a meal if he was uncertain of his next. His teachers seemed much more pragmatic.

It was unpleasant, but the water had not warmed, not in the wet chill of the dungeons, and the bread was passable for something that he shared with rats, so Arthur ate and made no attempt to complain. He didn't know where Merlin was and he didn't know how big the ruin was, either, so he sat himself down by the door and looked around.

There was one guard down the hall from him, but the guard seemed half-way to sleep and rather past rotund. Another club rested at his feet and there was a tankard of something or other by the leg of the chair he rested on, much nicer than the hammered tin cup Arthur was sipping from. Then, just at the guard's post, the hallway bent away and out of sight, which was probably why the guard was stationed where he was. If there were a great many prisoners, perhaps Arthur could incite them all to make as much trouble as possible and create some opening for them _all_ to escape, but it seemed that he and Merlin were the only ones. Why Merlin was of any consequence to them, Arthur still hadn't figured out, but he figured they were on their own, blast all his knights into hellfire and back.

If he'd been able to knight Lancelot, maybe there'd be some real hope of rescue; the knights weren't cold-hearted, but they weren't always driven to be particularly noble. Merlin, the damned idiot, had dragged him down from his forever-owed place at the top of the Ordnung of the royal household and now that he was seeing it from Merlin's point of view, he knew that even if his knights could find him and really did come, they might just leave the weakest of them behind. In fact, if they took the pragmatism of the Camelot military too far, they might kill Merlin just to make sure he couldn't tell their captors any more than they already had, rather than drag him around with them on horseback.

He banished those thoughts from his mind. He couldn't afford to think so poorly of his knights. It was the food—or lack of it—and the dark getting to him. The hopelessness of the situation, that too. And all the questions of what, exactly, Merlin knew.

After all, Merlin _knew_ why he was where he was. There had been no fearful uncertainty in his eyes when he had been taken away. Indeed, he seemed assured of his place in the world—not confident, not exactly, as he was still being beat to hell and back—but there was no question of why, only of what would happen next. It was strange to see in Merlin, for he rarely seemed as calm as he had walking Arthur through testing the extent of his injury. He would have been much more frantic if he'd known that Arthur was still not quite at his best.

The scant times Merlin had ever been as grimly comfortable as he acted now had been times of almost certain life or death, usually when he assured Arthur of his abilities. Something was wrong and Merlin knew it. Either he was certain he was not long for this world or there was some other, far worse threat that he knew of, something Merlin didn't think he could avoid.

If Merlin gave up secrets of the realm, Arthur would forgive him. He'd seen, though little else, the aftermath of what he'd endured. It was beyond reason to presume that any servant, with no training with any regard to resisting torture, should withstand such treatment.

He hoped Merlin would stop trying.

The man, the _boy,_ really—Merlin was younger than Arthur by at least a few years and the memory of Merlin's admittance thereof made Arthur burn with rage that _this_ was happening—was brought back to the cell just as the sun was setting. There were no half-hearted attempts at walking, no tension in his limbs. The same barbarians who had taken him away had brought him back, just as they had the last time, this time truly hauling Merlin along like deadweight. He looked nearly dead when they tossed him back inside, where Arthur caught him, again.

For a single, ghastly moment, Arthur really thought he wasn't breathing. His hands clenched in fear for a moment before he forced his mind into action and held a palm over Merlin's gaping mouth.

A soft, almost unnoticeable gust brushed against it, and Arthur could breathe again.

"Merlin," he hissed urgently, shaking him. "Merlin, can you hear me? Open your eyes if you can hear me, okay?"

Ever the rebel, Merlin squeezed his eyes shut. He fought Arthur's hands and groaned, struggling to escape, to get away. He couldn't be awake, he must have been still trapped in whatever hell his mind had created for him. He wasn't afraid of Arthur. He couldn't be.

"Wake up, Merlin. Wake up, we have to talk; we have to make sure you're better." Arthur tapped at Merlin's cheek, hoping there would be some response. "This can't go on, you have to get up and you have to—Merlin, I'm _ordering you_ to get up, open your eyes and just tell me you're not going to die in the next few hours. Just stay alive long enough to get out of here. I'll give you over to Gaius and he'll fix you. You'll be fine. I won't let you be otherwise."

Merlin writhed and moaned, but showed no sign of consciousness.

It was a long night. Merlin had been holding out for the past few days and wearing a strong mask, but he must be a better actor than Arthur had ever given him credit for; things were worse than Arthur had thought. A lot worse. Merlin was sweating and shivering, stilling for only a few moments before rising from his deeper delirium and thrashing again. Arthur had no idea how to help.

They didn't take Merlin that day, though at noon there were two plates and one of them had a few scraps of undesirable meat alongside the bread and water. Arthur encouraged Merlin to eat, but he vomited quite soon after Arthur forced him to choke it down.

It wasn't great.

None of this was very great.

It got worse when Merlin started scratching his neck bloody.

 _"Out!"_ he screamed, "Get it—I—hate it, hate it, hate it— _hurts!_ —please—"

"Merlin, what is it? What's going on?"

Merlin didn't give any coherent answer, so Arthur turned him over as gently as possible and examined the back of Merlin's neck. He was scratching with purpose at a single point; he'd torn through skin in his frenzy, all the way down to something hard. Arthur hoped it wasn't bone. He tapped it hesitantly and discovered that it clinked like metal, though why the hell there was a piece of metal sewn into Merlin's neck, he couldn't imagine.

He tried to steady Merlin, tried to give him some sort of comfort and stability, just enough to sleep, but didn't have much success. Instead, exhausted after a night of incessant caring and worry (not that he was worried for Merlin—no, it would just be ever so inconvenient if he died), Arthur passed out sometime after moving the two of them away from the vomit. He hugged Merlin to his chest in his sleep, still trying to keep him upright, and didn't spare any thought in his dark, empty dreamscape of what might be waiting for him when he woke.

* * *

Merlin was awake when Arthur opened his eyes. He wasn't thrashing or shrieking, but there was still blood coating his neck and his hands. He was also sitting under his own power, more or less. It was, in truth, done with the judicious aid of a wall, but Arthur appreciated that it was all a sight better than it had been before. He twisted, trying to judge the time from the hole, but Merlin simply said, "It isn't yet noon," and fell silent again, staring at Arthur with shadowed eyes.

"Are you better now?" Arthur asked, fearing the answer.

"I suppose. But I also suppose I will get worse again. We haven't exactly been let out."

The truth of it—not to mention how casual Merlin was—rankled. "What happened last night? What's that in your neck?" He might have merely imagined the sourness that overtook Merlin's expression for a moment, or it had been there and then hidden.

"Nothing I wouldn't expect from something like this," came the evasion. "And merely a coin, I believe. Nothing you need to worry about."

It was unsettling, feeling as though Merlin had all the answers. Out of everyone at their site of captivity, Merlin seemed to know the most. Oh, he was miserly with his knowledge, but he had it. Instead of remarking on this, Arthur shrugged and asked, "So you're lucid now?"

"If I say no, will I avoid whatever else you want to ask me?"

"Not likely, unless you keel over."

"Then yes, fine, I'm lucid."

"Will you ever tell me why we're here, or will I simply have to make an appointment with the stocks?" Not that he would, after all this. It seemed really rather cruel.

Merlin deliberated for a moment before saying slowly, like he was being far more careful with his words than normal, "Someday, yes, I'll make sure you know. I'm—I hope you know how sorry I am. For all of this. That you're here, I mean."

"If I wasn't here, it would be fine?"

Merlin didn't say anything to that. It was unsettling, that's what it was; Merlin was chattier than a starling most days. Now, he seemed reluctant to utter even a single sentence.

Arthur huffed. "You know, I _am_ the prince."

"Yes, what about it?"

"You can't talk to me like this."

A snort, but the tiny shudder of movement through Merlin's shoulder forced Arthur into keen awareness of how little his injured friend was moving. "I thought we were done with that. I thought I could talk to you however I wanted."

His impudence wasn't quite normal enough to be reassuring.

"Just tell them what they want. It's fine. It's torture, Merlin; I don't expect you to keep on like this." Arthur's stomach growled, but Merlin's had to be worse, so he didn't say anything about it. "You're not meant to be treated like this and if it continues, I don't know how intact you'll be when we get back." If they got back. If his knights didn't leave Merlin behind. If Merlin wasn't killed before then.

Merlin was silent for a moment and Arthur didn't expect him to respond, but he did. "I wish you weren't here for this. It would be easier if you weren't."

Arthur couldn't believe that anything short of the inability to feel pain would make this whole ordeal easier, but he contented himself with a nod. A slow fire was burning in his gut and eating up more and more of him every second, but yelling at Merlin or throwing whatever he got his hands on wouldn't make this easier, either.

"If you find something sharp enough to cut skin with," Merlin said out of the blue, "will you give it to me?"

"What would you do with it if I did?"

"Damage."

"Right." He paused, thinking a little more. "Damage to who?"

Merlin smiled and Arthur could see, with sudden clarity, how exhausted Merlin really was. He was still shirtless, still red with sticky blood even on his face and shoulders, which had been bare the other day. Arthur had some suspicions regarding that particular detail, but didn't want to ask Merlin the details of his torture, only why. "Haven't decided yet." It was an unsettling answer, but Merlin shifted with a grunt and plowed into a new topic. "How long has it been since they last brought me back?"

"Maybe a day. One full night and nearing a day, at any rate." Arthur clenched his hands, still stuck on the possibility of Merlin's death. "And they won't take you again. I'll make sure of it."

"No," Merlin replied with strange authority, dropping his smile, "you won't."

"They nearly killed you last time. I'm not going to let that happen to you—you're my responsibility, after all." He didn't like telling Merlin that, but it was true; everyone with a servant had to be aware of their welfare. Not that Merlin would see it as a matter of decorum or custom. No, he'd insist on how this meant they were _friends_ or some other rubbish, which they weren't.

"That's very kind of you, prat, but you're not hearing me. You can't do anything about it."

"I can kill them before they kill you."

Merlin tilted his head ever so slightly to the side, staring at Arthur steadily. "Can you? Really?" He moved as if he wanted to gesture at something—Arthur, maybe, or their surroundings—but his hand dropped. "With no weapons around you? They're not exactly shy with theirs. They'll kill you. At least they need me to talk."

"I don't like this."

"Neither do I." They sat in silence for a while longer. Merlin seemed... restrained. Not that he was tied to anything that Arthur could see, but it appeared that there was something holding him back from what he wanted to say or do. Maybe it was the injuries, but life-threatening injury had never stopped Merlin before. Now, when he seemed in his own eerie element, Arthur thought it rather unlikely that anything could stop him at all. It was a relief when Merlin opened his mouth. "How's your head? Are you feeling dizzy at all?"

"I'm fine," Arthur answered automatically.

"I believe I recall you telling me that such a reply was bullshit just a few days ago."

"Between the two of us, I really don't think I'm the one we ought to be worried about. Leave it alone."

"I'm a physician's apprentice, Arthur, I'm not going to leave your potential concussion 'alone.'" He huffed and started to move, but didn't get far before Arthur leapt to his feet and pushed him back down.

"Yes, you are." He gritted his teeth. "I'm the prince and I'm ordering you to ignore this. You hear that, Merlin? I'm _ordering_ you." He tried to reposition Merlin, but brushed against his shoulder by accident. Merlin sucked in a breath and squeezed his eyes shut, but made an effort to grin back. It looked more like a grimace.

"Then I respectfully decline."

"That's not allowed. I'm not allowing it."

Merlin barked a laugh, then started giggling. Before long, his bout of mirth turned into full-blown guffaws which had him gasping for breath in any space in between. "I'm a criminal! Oh, lo and behold, I'm an honest-to-goodness criminal!"

"Stop it, Merlin. Stop it." When the hysterical manservant refused to obey, Arthur shook him, first lightly, then harder. "Stop. Merlin, that's not funny. Stop laughing. _Stop."_

The laughter did eventually die down, but it had taken all of Merlin's inconsiderable energy. He slumped forward into Arthur and passed out.

"Great," said Arthur aloud, to no one, "I'm sure this will have no lasting consequences for his psyche."

* * *

They came for Merlin later that day, when he was still sleeping. Arthur had pulled him over to the wall farthest from the door and was holding him up as best as he could, waiting. He'd meant what he'd said. Merlin wasn't going to be taken again. Not today, not ever again. It had gone on more than long enough.

The same three brutes entered the cell, carrying their clubs. They saw Arthur at the back of the cell and grinned with half-empty mouths. They nudged each other for a second, then rushed him on unsteady feet. They must have been drunk, though why they'd been drinking was unknown to him, just like everything in this stupid, gods-forsaken ruin. He pulled himself to his feet, ready to do whatever he had to, when a clear voice cut through the blossoming chaos.

"Bring them both," the voice said. Arthur didn't recognize it and the owner was hidden behind the hulking silhouettes of his attackers, but maybe if he was there, he could stop it. Maybe. "Bind the prince; make sure he knows he hasn't any power here. Just toss the other one over your shoulder. He's not got long, anyway."

Arthur's blood ran cold and froze him.

He could feel them tying his hands with rough rope and pulling him along, which was humiliating at a distance, but he was removed from it, too. He saw the walls of the ruin and watched the entourage twist and wind to their destination, but he wasn't thinking of its layout. All he could hear, over and over again, was _"He's not got long, anyway."_ How far was Merlin from death? Why hadn't he tried to do something about it instead of brushing off any offer of assistance? Dammit, Merlin, why hadn't he understood that Arthur was trying to help?

He was snapped from his downward spiral when they shoved him into a chair and tied him to it. It was a jolt, but not a painful one. He suspected he still wasn't there to be tortured.

Merlin's hands were locked into a pair of iron cuffs attached to the floor. One of the thugs kicked him awake.

He groaned, stirred, and tried to pull himself into a sitting position, the idiot. Arthur tried to say "don't you dare," but one of the thugs—the one with a crooked scar near his eye, which Arthur could only see in this room, which was glaringly lit with candles—clapped a hand over his mouth and held his jaw shut. Merlin looked at the disturbance, his eyes meeting Arthur's. Something in them went cold, like Arthur's blood.

"Keep ya mouth closed, eh?" sneered the scarred thug. "Jus' enjoy ta show."

The voice that Arthur had yet to attach to a person spoke again, clear and cold like a river. "Gag him and get it over with. We're not here to dawdle."

Apparently their kidnappers had nothing but rope. The same coarse cord that trapped his hands and feet was wrapped around his head, and he had to admit that it did make an efficient gag. Instead of making a fool of himself trying to talk, Arthur glared at everything in his line of sight.

"Why's he here?" Merlin asked, his voice calm. Not that he was fooling anyone. At least, anyone that knew him.

"Just some added encouragement," said the river voice. "Don't you like your friend?"

"I'm sure he'd dispute that relationship."

"Mm. A pity. A spy is always preferable to a politician, but if I have to resort to your prince, I will. Though I don't suppose the coin trick will work on him, now will it?"

Merlin's eyes flickered back to Arthur, a streak of fear in them, undisguised. There were secrets in what the river's voice was saying, secrets Merlin knew and he didn't. 'The coin trick,' 'a spy.' Arthur didn't know if he wanted to hear the truth.

"No," Merlin answered, clenching his jaw. "It would be unpleasant, even for him, but it wouldn't work. He's too much of a prat."

Was this Merlin's way of communicating with him? What could he possibly mean by it?

"Then I suppose we'll just have to keep bending you 'till you break." There was a soft clatter, the sound of metal hitting metal. The three enforcers shifted to surround Merlin, though Arthur could still see his face, far too resigned. He could also see the sixth person in the room.

They were tall, but not inhumanly so. They were dressed well and moved primly, belying some courtly experience. Their hair was long and looked meticulously cared for, but the frame of their body gave no hints to their gender. Their long fingers moved from one shining instrument to another, as if selecting a broach from an envied collection. "Perhaps we'll return to your fingers, hm?" they said, turning. Arthur was sure he'd never seen them in his life. "I'm sure the rest of you is _aching."_

"I'm quite comfortable, actually," Merlin replied, trying to sound nonchalant and failing.

The torturer smiled. "Of course." Their face turned sour and they gestured to one of their grunts. "Hold his right arm for me."

Merlin's own face shuttered into the detached emptiness Arthur had only seen a few times before. He was afraid, then. Deathly afraid and determined not to let anyone know.

"Let's try this one more time." The torturer at last decided on a tool: a long, polished piece of metal with a hole on end like the eye of a needle. "Tell me about your organization. Let's start with who runs it."

Merlin bestowed the torturer with such a disparaging look that Arthur was taken aback. Sure, this person was loathsome, but Merlin hardly seemed the kind of person to be able to express such hatred and disgust. He said nothing.

Arthur tried to think of that resolute determination, rather than the fact his servant worked for someone else. For some organization that he didn't know about and was worth torturing Merlin for.

"I see. Such a shame about your hand, then," said the torturer, fitting the hoop around Merlin's index finger and _shoving_ it towards his elbow. There was an audible _crack_ but Merlin said nothing. He just closed his eyes. Arthur, however, lunged forward in his seat, unbalancing it just enough for him to tip forward and then fall back on all four legs. This was wrong, so wrong, and he could deal with whatever Merlin was hiding later, he just needed to _get them out of there._ "I'm sure your employer will fix that right up for you, won't they? You're all the same kind of thing, right?"

Arthur bristled at the implication Merlin wasn't human. If _anyone_ here wasn't human, it was this courtly torturer, talking like a witchfinder—

Oh.

Oh, _fuck._

That would explain it all, wouldn't it? Of course Merlin knew things Arthur didn't, assuming he was a sorcerer. He would know all kinds of things that Arthur wouldn't. And the coin... was it iron? It would explain how desperate he'd been, in his delirium, to get it out. Was Merlin's neck still bleeding?

If everyone in Merlin's "organization" was "the same kind of thing," then Merlin was working for a network of sorcerers, all embedded in Camelot as—as—what had the torturer said, again? Spies? Merlin had been spying on him, foiling his efforts to help others, twisting the political process, all along stringing him and his knights along like dullards—

But no. Not Merlin. That wasn't right. It had to be wrong. Merlin... Merlin wouldn't do that. He _couldn't._ Could he? What else was he lying about?

Merlin still said nothing.

The torturer moved the hoop to a new finger. "If that's too hard, why don't we try this: what's your position?" Merlin stared dead ahead, not at Arthur or at anyone else, and clenched his jaw tighter. "That's fine. You have seven fingers left." And they _pushed_ and _snapped_ again, prompting only a hiss. Arthur slumped back in his chair, stunned and impotent. What could he do now? What _should_ he do, when considering the fate of a manservant who had betrayed him?

Merlin shifted to look the torturer in the eye, unflinching. "Even if you took my hands, I would never breathe a word of what I've sworn away. Even should you cut off my feet, I will never tell you my name. I would sooner cut out my own tongue than forsake what I've worked for. All you know is my brand, and that does not make me afraid."

Arthur couldn't see the torturer's face anymore, but he imagined they were smiling. "But what about him?" They aimed an arm at Arthur. "Do you fear him? Do you fear what he thinks?"

Merlin did not reply or look away, but Arthur thought there was some twist in his expression, no matter how brief.

"Shall we show him, then? Will you tell your prince what this brand on your leg means?" They tugged the cuff of Merlin's pants up, revealing a circular scar on his calf. Arthur couldn't make out any detail. "Tell him, then. Confess."

Merlin didn't look at him. Instead, he continued to glare steadily at the torturer, as if Arthur was of no consequence to him. "I will tell you nothing. Anything I have to say to him will be said in private, not for an audience of overeager mercenaries."

So Merlin—the spy, the sorcerer, the traitor—would keep his secrets. Hadn't Merlin said something about telling Arthur why he was being tortured, that he'd do it one day? Why would he say that? Why would he admit his many, many crimes to someone who was the very embodiment of all he was working against? Or did he mean that one day Arthur would know because Merlin was there to kill him or usurp him or torture him?

Arthur knew only one thing for certain: this cool, unmoving Merlin was not the Merlin he knew. This was a man in control, even with his fingers being broken one by one. This was a man with unshakeable confidence in his cause. This was not the boy Arthur looked out for on patrol. This was someone he had never met.

* * *

They were hauled back to the cell after an unknowable amount of time; the blazing candles kept them perpetually in the feeling of day, even though the crack in their cell was dark. Arthur's gag had been removed and his hands were free, but he did not speak or move them. He caught Merlin glancing his way when he could, but the traitor was hung between two of the brutes, while the scarred one pushed Arthur forward by his neck.

Just before rounding the last corner to the corridor with hosted their cell, Merlin groaned and sagged closer to the ground, dragging his escorts with him. Arthur tried to turn, but the scarred man continued to shove, so he twisted even further and kicked backward as hard as he could. Traitor or not, Merlin was a criminal of Camelot and would be tried as such. Arthur had to drag him back to his own courts and judges, stupid thugs be damned.

But as he turned, he saw Merlin surge to his feet, unbalancing the two hooligans holding him. They'd been holding him _up,_ not down, and lost their grip. He didn't try to kick them (Arthur rather thought any attempt would be more than pitiful), instead lunging to Arthur and grabbing his hand.

"Follow me!" he demanded, and Arthur did. Anything would be better than this fight, where they were out-matched and tired. And if Merlin tried to kill him... well, Arthur wouldn't make the mistake of underestimating his servant— _ex-_ servant—but he was pretty sure he could beat Merlin in a fight.

Merlin led them back the way they came for a bit, then took a sudden turn to a stairwell and went up, moving as fast as he could. He was heaving for breath before long, but kept going. Arthur didn't dare move ahead of him; not only did he not know where Merlin intended to go, he didn't trust Merlin enough to have him at his back. There was too much drilled into his head about guarding his rear to ignore. But by the second floor, Merlin was swaying on his feet as he tried to climb, pushing himself along with the aid of the wall and biting back gasps of pain when he pressed against his broken fingers. Arthur certainly hadn't forgotten the delirium from just a few days before, nor the malnourishment they were both enduring, nor the wounds littering Merlin's skin. No, Merlin was in no shape to be moving like this and, scum of the earth or not, he knew where he was going. Maybe, just for now, he could think of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' and trust Merlin enough to escape. Not more than that, and not enough to let him back into Camelot, but just enough.

He hoisted Merlin into a damsel's carry and grunted, "Tell me where to turn."

They continued climbing.

"Here," Merlin said, still wheezing. "There's another stairwell just along this hall. We need to go all the way to the top."

Arthur didn't ask how he knew. He just pivoted and carried on.

After following Merlin's instructions, Arthur found himself at the very top of a bell tower, though the bell was no longer suspended. He set Merlin down and situated himself on the opposite side of the tower. "You'd better have a damn good explanation for this."

Merlin was lying down for once, instead of making everything worse through sheer stupid stubbornness. He grunted.

_"Today."_

"They won't expect us to run further into the ruin," Merlin said, which wasn't even remotely related to what Arthur wanted answers about. "They'll go further out and stretch themselves thin. There's maybe twenty of them, total, so not enough to mount a full-scale search. We can head out when tomorrow, I think. Tomorrow evening."

"Great," Arthur snarled. "You know that's not what I meant."

The traitor just sighed. "Yes, I know. I don't really know what you _do_ want me to say, though. And we might want to save it until we're really out of the woods."

"I think I'd rather we hash it out now."

"Why, so you know whether or not to bother helping me back?"

That was harsher than Arthur had been thinking but... it wasn't entirely incorrect. He had his misgivings— _a lot_ of them—and it might be easier to just leave Merlin behind than have him endure a trial and a noose. It cost the country less money, for one, to avoid the trial. It also let those Merlin knew go on thinking he was a perfectly upstanding citizen, if a little clumsy and bad at his job. It would spare Gaius the pain of knowing his apprentice had committed treason.

Merlin just looked at him, all the fight that had steeled his gaze in the torture room gone. He looked exhausted, just as he had for the past few days, but now with something that looked like acceptance. Arthur wanted to snap at him for something, anything, but he couldn't find it in him to speak.

"I suppose that's about what I expected," Merlin said. "I'll still tell you. I understand if you leave me here. I know what I've done and I knew what the consequences could be when I made my decisions. I don't think I regret them."

"Just say it," Arthur spat.

Merlin looked back at the half-crumbled ceiling of the bell tower. Arthur had laid him in a patch without much cover; it hadn't been deliberate, but there was no way he was moving Merlin now. He was going to wait for Merlin's confession, make a decision about keeping him alive, and then make any further decisions regarding Merlin's continued health. Until that happened, Merlin wasn't going to be moved. At least not by him.

How things had changed, just in a day...

"My brand might make it easier to explain," said Merlin as he struggled to move his leg close enough to him to roll the pant leg up. "It's a symbol of loyalty and if you saw it, you might understand. It would be harder to explain why I never said anything, of course, but I always told myself it was the nature of the work—if you knew, you might try to stop me, I guess, or maybe you'd do something else to disrupt it." It wasn't exactly comforting, but Merlin couldn't even push his pants up. It was a little pathetic, really. After a moment of hesitation, Arthur crossed the tower, shoved the fabric away, and manipulated Merlin's leg to look at the brand.

It was a dragon. In fact, it looked rather like the Pendragon dragon—rounded and simplified, but definitely it.

"What is this?"

"Exactly what you think it is," Merlin said tightly, "unless I've really misjudged you."

There were several things Arthur wanted to ask. Among them were _"who did this to you?"_ and _"did you choose this?"_ and _"why?"_ But he couldn't settle on any of them. He shook his head. "What does it mean? To you, in any way you'd choose to define that."

Merlin hummed, clearly thinking. "It means that I do things for you. Not just 'things,' either; it means that everything I do serves you, and Camelot. It means that any lies I tell or secrets I keep are for that purpose, too. It means I swore myself to secrecy on all that I do for this, and that I will tell you, and only you unless you bid otherwise, what I spend my scant free time doing. And it means that if I break that oath, I—" He didn't continue, but Arthur got the picture. A very strange picture of unswerving devotion to Arthur specifically, but a picture nevertheless.

"Why?"

Merlin was slower to respond to that. "People tell me things. About you. And about what my life looks like with you in it. You're important, Arthur, not just to me, but to the future of Albion. And I have the lot of being responsible for you."

"I don't understand."

"That's fine. You don't have to."

"No, I clearly _do_ have to understand. You have _one job:_ that was to be my manservant. It did not _ever_ mean that you join some weird cult of sorcerers or that you got _used to torture_! I never asked you to do any of this. This is literally not in your job description and I never _wanted_ any of this from you." He huffed and moved back to the other side of the tower. "I don't understand why you think you have to do this."

For a long moment, there was no response. Arthur almost thought Merlin had fallen asleep and moved to check on him, but Merlin answered before Arthur could get to him. "Did you know there's a dragon underneath Camelot?"

Arthur jerked back and sat down before he could fling himself off the edge. "No."

"Well, there is. Your father slaughtered all the rest of them, but he kept one in the caverns underneath the citadel. I haven't the foggiest idea why, since it isn't like he parades it around as a trophy, but the dragon is certainly there. He's of magic, of course, and he's a pain in the neck and he called to me the first night I was in Camelot. I was sleeping—or trying to—and he summoned me down to his cave." Merlin shifted on the ground. "He told me I had to protect you. And I have, ever since."

"I understand," said Arthur, his heart sinking, "you did this out of duty."

"Not anymore," Merlin interjected quickly. "In the beginning, yes, it was duty. I didn't like you much and would've quit the job with you if I didn't feel like I had to stay and see everything through. But now—or later, since I don't know where we stand now—I thought we became something like friends. And I wanted to continue to help you, not because you were the prince and it was my job, but because I didn't want anything to happen to you."

"But you have magic," Arthur burst out because he couldn't hold the revelation back anymore. Merlin jolted, then winced, but his pupils remained blown wide. "Why would someone with magic ever protect me?"

"How did you know?"

Arthur shrugged. "Just little things. Things the torturer said to you and about you. The idea popped into my head and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. It explains a lot of things that I can't think of another explanation for."

Merlin, if possible, deflated even further. He sank a little, looking drained. "I wish you hadn't been there."

"Why, so you could continue lying?"

"No!" A pause. "Yes. Kind of. I just wish I'd been able to explain all this on my own terms."

"Would you really have told me if nothing had pushed you to it?"

"I don't know. Not now, probably. I'd tell you later, when things were peaceful or something like that. I'd try to explain everything I'd done and accept whatever consequences you laid out for me. It wouldn't be... perfect, or ideal, but it would be the best I could do." Merlin tried to roll onto his side, but flinched as he moved and had to roll back. "I wanted to tell you eventually, but my job is easier when you don't know anything about it."

"Protecting me is easier when I don't know you're doing it?"

"Believe it or not."

Arthur didn't believe it, but he didn't pursue it, either. He had other things to worry about. "And what's this about an organization? You have some other employer?"

"Well, there is Gaius."

"Other than Gaius."

"Then I don't have any other employer." Merlin still wasn't moving much, but that was fair. He'd just gone through another round of torture. "You could say I'm self-employed. But as for the organization, yes, I belong to a network of informants who keep an eye on the affairs of other countries, as well as the occasional scheming nobleman within the court. An intelligence network, you might say."

"So you _are_ a spy."

"Yes, but _for_ you, not _on_ you."

"And if you're part of this network, then you _do_ have an employer other than myself and Gaius. I don't control this network, therefore it's not mine. I'm not benefitting from it at all." He tried to keep his voice down, still wary of the people below them.

Merlin snorted. "You don't get it. _I_ run the network. It's _mine._ It was pure dumb luck they picked me up, rather than one of my agents, but _that's_ what I meant by 'self-employed.' Their information makes it easier for me to protect you or to deploy an agent of mine inside the court to handle the problem. Every question they asked me amounted to the same thing, even if they didn't know it. And that's information I don't want them to have."

No wonder Merlin was so in control, even in the face of violence. He really did know more than Arthur and more than almost anyone in the entire country. The head of an intelligence network! As well as a sorcerer.

"Anyway," Merlin continued, "that's about the long and the short of it. What are you going to do with me?"

"I'm not going to kill you."

"Now, or at all?"

"At all. If everything you've said is true, then I think I owe you a lot more than a short drop."

"Yes, I think I at least deserve a long one."

"Not that either." Arthur groaned; Merlin wasn't exactly as cheery as usual (which made sense, given the circumstances) but at least he was making jokes. "I mean that I want to reward you, somehow. I want to... have you recognized in the court. You deserve that. And I want to learn more about what you've done and your network and your..."

"My magic?"

"Yes. That."

"Well, the recognition is right out. My job would be impossible if everyone knew who I was." Arthur had to admit that the identity of a spymaster probably ought to be kept under wraps. "And a reward worked out so well the last time, so I think I'll pass on that, too." It took Arthur a second longer to understand what he meant; when his father had assigned Merlin to his service. Was it really that bad? "But if you want to learn more, I'd be happy to oblige you."

"Then you have to stay alive long enough to do that. Don't even _think_ about dying."

"Deal."

* * *

Arthur let Merlin sleep the day away. He caught snatches of rest himself, but was by-and-large too worried about the people looking for them to really relax. As soon as the sun started dipping below the horizon, though, he crept to Merlin's side to rouse him. At least it had been a peaceful sleep. Even though he knew things now that... made him uncomfortable, to understate it, he still worried about Merlin. Surely not all of his manservant's clumsiness was faked, nor his penchant for getting into trouble. If anything, it seemed he downplayed all that he got caught up in, rather than exaggerating it.

"Come on, lazy bones, get up. You said tomorrow evening, and tomorrow evening it is." He tried not to jostle Merlin at all, but it was tricky to wake him up otherwise, particularly when Merlin seemed to have no interest in waking up. "We have to get moving, Merlin."

The response was an arm flung limply around his neck and a groan.

"Don't tell me you want to be carried all the way out of this gods-forsaken ruin."

Merlin at last deigned to open his eyes, even just a crack, and slid his gaze towards Arthur. "I just need your help getting up, prat, then you can walk on the other side of the stairs again."

Clearly, Merlin didn't think he was forgiven. And... maybe he wasn't yet, not really, but it wasn't like Arthur hated him now. As a prince and a military commander and a politician, Arthur understood the decisions Merlin had made. The world wasn't black and white, cleft in two tones of right and wrong, good and evil, pure and defiled. Merlin had been right all along: this had been messy. It was going to continue to be messy. Not that any of this was going to be said aloud; no, Arthur chose instead to roll his eyes and haul Merlin to his feet.

He tried to ignore Merlin's groan and how he winced from the movement.

"Let's go," Arthur said, leading them back down the steps of the bell tower. His only confirmation of Merlin's presence behind him was the occasional grunt, but he wasn't sure how to make conversation anymore. Yesterday, he'd been looking for information, just enough to make sense of his new reality. Now, his hunger for answers sated, how could he go back to teasing and joking, knowing how powerful Merlin was as both a political force and a force of nature? Were they ever going to be friends again, well and truly?

As they neared the floor they'd been held on, Arthur slowed. He'd figured Merlin wanted to make his move here, but he didn't know the layout himself. He needed Merlin's guidance, as strange as that seemed.

"Where do we go from here?" he asked. Merlin groaned incoherently behind him and Arthur turned to see him sag against the wall. His eyes were glassy, roaming the stairwell like he was looking for invisible enemies that he was sure swarmed him. Arthur sighed and pulled an arm around his neck. "You're supposed to tell me when things are going to shit."

"Like y' care," Merlin mumbled into his shirt.

"I'd prefer not to die in this fucking ruin."

Merlin expelled a gust of disbelieving air through his nose. "Go for it, then. Put me down and skedaddle."

"I'd prefer that _you_ don't die in this fucking ruin, either." Arthur adjusted his grip and started to help his idiot down the stairs. "So where do we go from here?"

In a tiny voice that Arthur only heard because of how close he was, Merlin said, "That's the best I'm going to get, isn't it?" Before Arthur could try to amend his admittance that he really did worry for Merlin, even to the point of—gods forbid— _caring,_ Merlin added, "Turn left up here. I'll tell you where to go after that."

Merlin did just that, murmuring directions and advice as they dodged the scant guards along their chosen route. They finally got all out of the building to see a green expanse dotted by the long-decomposed corpse of the fortress's extended fingers, all cast in the dim shroud of dusk. Arthur lay Merlin in the corner of one of the brick bones and picked up another stone to hunt some of the patrolling barbarians.

The stupid man didn't even know what hit him. Arthur stalked him from behind, creeping closer and closer before vaulting out of the long grass and slamming the stone into the man's hollow head.

He fell with a soft thump. Arthur decided he was done; the coast was clear enough to retrieve Merlin and move on.

He'd done such a good job of hiding Merlin, actually, that he very nearly tripped right over the poor man. His eyes were closed and his mouth hung open as if in sleep, sending a chill down Arthur's spine. He hadn't left him long enough for the idiot to _expire,_ surely. He dropped to a crouch, gently rocking Merlin back and forth to wake him. "Come on, Merlin, you've slept long enough. Merlin, get up for me. Open your eyes. _Dammit,_ Merlin, we can't keep doing this." He shook Merlin with a little more intensity, banking on the possibility of pain to rouse him. "It was one thing when you were late bringing my breakfast, but you're going to give me a heart attack if you keep on like this. Which I bet is just what you'd like— _Merlin, I swear to all that's holy—_ "

"'m up," came the garbled reply. "F'k'ff."

"No. Did you have a plan once we got outside?"

"Mm."

"You gotta give me more than that, Merlin. If you've got nothing to say, I'm just going to pick a direction and _go,_ so you better tell me what I'm doing wrong now, rather than later." He hefted Merlin into another bridal carry. "You can spend a whole day complaining about how I put my clothes away or the state of my floors, but you can't whine enough to tell me where I'm supposed to go?"

Merlin wriggled ineffectually, just enough to get one of his arms out of Arthur's hold. He held it out, waffled on the exact direction for a second, then declared, "Tha' way."

Arthur peered along Merlin's arm, looking for something significant. "Are you sure?"

A grunt. "I..." Arthur started moving in towards where Merlin had indicated, since any conversation could surely wait now. In a small voice, Merlin said, "Think 'm gonna pass out."

Arthur stiffened, but didn't stop. "Then you have to tell me what you're thinking. Give me directions. Where are we going, how do I get there, things like that. Can you do that for me, Merlin? Just tell me that much."

Instead of answering, Merlin raised his arm again and summoned a gold line that wound its way through the landscape in front of them. "C'n y'see it?"

Arthur gaped.

 _"Ar'hur,_ c'n y'see it?"

"Yes, yes, I can see it. It's... it's beautiful."

"It'll go t' s'f house. Jus' follow it down ta line..."

Merlin's arm dropped, but Arthur could still feel his heartbeat. He shifted Merlin, protecting his head, and followed the golden thread.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! This took me about half a month to write (at the cost of my homework -_-) and I kept going over it and worrying and then I decided to just post it during our whack month of quarantine, so here it is! If you liked it, please leave me kudos or a comment!


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